In this seminar Nick Bird looks at the key developments in professional indemnity insurance for solicitors including a review of the MTC, observations on the key issues affecting the market, and the latest case law affecting policy terms.
Always Look on The Bright Side of Life – an overview of the life insurance sector
- What is life insurance and how does it differ from indemnity insurance
- Insurable interest
- Assignment
- Use of Life Insurance as an investment tool
- Use of Life Insurance in tax affairs
- Presentation of the Risk
- Common coverage disputes
Manoj Vaghela is a partner in Charles Russell Speechlys’ Litigation Dispute Resolution team. He specialises in handling complex and high value disputes, often with an international element and usually involving insurance.
He has led and managed teams of lawyers from various countries on complex multi-party and multi-jurisdictional insurance and reinsurance disputes arising out of Life Insurance, Business Interruption Insurance, Bermuda Form Insurance, Clinical Trials, Cyber Liability, Construction All Risks, Professional Liability, Management Liability, D&O, Commercial Crime, Trade Credit and Product Recall.
Manoj specialises in shareholder disputes and is a specialist on product safety. He has worked with a consortium of leading academics and research scientists on the GUIDEnano project for the European Union investigating the safety aspects of nanotechnology.
The session will focus on:
The reinsurance of captive and fronting insurers give rise to complex legal issues. These include duties of fair presentation of the risk to the captive/front and to the reinsurer, the operation of cut-through clauses, and the impact on the reinsurance of the original insured’s and insurer’s obligations under the direct insurance. The lecture will address these and other issues.
Peter MacDonald Eggers QC is a barrister practising at 7 King’s Bench Walk in London specialising in all aspects of commercial law, with a particular emphasis on insurance and reinsurance. Peter practised as a solicitor before being called to the Bar by the Middle Temple in 1999. He was appointed a Queen’s Counsel in 2011. He is co-author of Good Faith and Insurance Contracts and Carver on Charterparties, author of Deceit: The Lie of the Law and The Vitiation of Contractual Consent, and a Contributing Editor of Chitty on Contracts. He teaches at University College London and King’s College London. Peter is a Deputy Judge of the High Court and sits as an arbitrator. Peter has most recently appeared as counsel in Enemalta v Standard Club Asia, Axis Corporate Capital v ABSA Group, Aegean Baltic Bank v Renzlor Shipping, Generali Italia v Pelagic Fisheries and Aspen Underwriting v Credit Europe. Peter is currently Chair of BILA.
Colin Edelman QC and Andrew Burns QC in conversation about some of the new cases and issues covered in the 2021 edition of their book.
- Reinsurance aggregation
- What are the new lessons still being learned from WTC 9/11 claims?
- What are some of the reinsurance issues which arises from Covid claims and the Arch judgment?
- Reinsurance allocation
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- Equitas v MMI – the court’s approach to spiking of reinsurance claims
- Whether a duty of good faith should be implied into reinsurance policies
- Teal v Berkeley – exhaustion of policies using principles of contractual construction and commerciality
Colin Edelman QC is widely recognised as the pre-eminent insurance and reinsurance silk in the UK, rated as a star individual by the directories and winning Silk of the Year on numerous occasions. He specialises in high value complex commercial disputes and has appeared in most of the leading insurance cases in the Supreme Court in recent years. He acts and advises in high profile matters affecting the London and international insurance markets, including disputes arising out of most of the major natural disasters and financial collapses of the last decade. He sat as a deputy High Court Judge for a number of years, is a highly respected arbitrator and is Chairman of the Bar Mutual Indemnity Fund.
Andrew Burns QC is Head of Chambers at Devereux Chambers, specialising in insurance and reinsurance, employment law and injunctions. Andrew acts for a range of insurers and policyholders in coverage disputes and policy interpretation points. He specialises in employers’ liability (appearing in the Employers’ Liability Policy Trigger Litigation and Redman v Zurich) and issues arising from PHI and other employment related insurance. He has long experience in aggregation disputes appearing in Simmonds v Gammell and Countrywide v Marshall.
The Law of Reinsurance (OUP, 3rd Edition, 2021) is a specialist and focussed text on reinsurance law, uncluttered by repetition of general insurance principles. It offers comprehensive but concise coverage of issues from definition and purpose to types of reinsurance and analysis of controversial and undecided issues. The new edition considers the impact of the Insurance Act 2015 on reinsurance litigation and arbitration – particularly reinsurance non-disclosure, warranties and remedies. It discusses reinsurance spiking and allocation to policy years, ascertainment of loss, aggregation and the duty of good faith in exercising a reinsurer’s discretion.
The Law of Reinsurance, 3rd edition book can be purchased using the following link which includes an applied discount.
The Law of Reinsurance, 3rd Edition – Colin Edelman, QC and Andrew Burns QC
Martin Moore QC will examine the current state of the law on Part VII insurance business transfers following the Court of Appeal judgment plus a few observations on possible future trends.
Described in Chambers and Partners as “An adviser of the highest quality on company matters, who is regularly instructed on some of the largest and most complicated takeovers and transactions”/
Martin is a leading Silk for company law litigation and advice, corporate finance, financial services and insolvency.
He has particular expertise in large-scale, complex corporate transactions and reorganisations (including takeovers and mergers), schemes of arrangement, and schemes for the transfer of insurance, and banking business (Part VII transfers).
Professor Green was appointed as Law Commissioner for Commercial and Common law on 01 January 2020. She was previously Professor of Private Law at the University of Bristol. Prior to that, she was Professor of the Law of Obligations at the University of Oxford, and, before that, a lecturer at the University of Birmingham from 2001 – 2010. Before embarking on her academic career, she was a software consultant at Accenture.
Professor Green has written about a variety of issues including virtual currencies, blockchain issues surrounding intermediated securities, smart contracts, sale of goods law as applicable to digitised assets, and wage theft.
Andrew McGahey and David Strahan of Kennedys (Dublin) will provide an overview of the key features of the Consumer Insurance Contracts Act 2019, the implications of its phased commencement during 2020 and 2021 and how it compares to consumer insurance law in England and Wales. Andrew and David will also briefly touch upon other upcoming legislative reforms that will impact Insurers in Ireland, including new judicial guidelines on the quantification of damages for personal injury.
Andrew joined Kennedys in January 2018 from an international law firm in London where he was a partner. Andrew heads Kennedys’ Dublin office and is the Regional Manager Partner for Kennedys’ European offices. He holds practising certificates in both Ireland and England & Wales and has over 20 years’ experience of advising insurers on policy coverage issues and defending third party claims. He has substantial experience of advising insurers and insureds on claims involving directors’ and officers’ liability, financial institutions and professionals. He has recently been heavily involved in advising insurers and reinsurers on COVID-19 business interruption claims. Andrew is a recognised individual in the Legal 500 and is described as “first rate” and “an excellent negotiator” who “always gives measured and astute advice”.
David joined Kennedys in 2019 from a leading Irish firm. He provides strategic advice to the insurance and reinsurance sector, with a particular focus on policy interpretation and coverage, indemnity issues and liability defence claims. He acts for major insurers and self-insureds across all lines of business. David also has considerable experience managing large-scale commercial disputes before the Irish Commercial Court and arbitrations under the International Chamber of Commerce Rules. He also represents life insurance companies in hearings before the Financial Services Ombudsman. David is recognised in the 2019 edition of the Legal 500, Insurance (Ireland) and the 2020 edition of Chambers, Insurance: Dispute Resolution (Ireland).
Brendan McGurk, Barrister at Monckton Chambers
Brendan is a barrister at Monckton Chambers in London, specialising in both commercial and public law. He is the co-author of Professional Indemnity Insurance Law, the leading practitioners’ text on the subject, and the sole author of Data Profiling and Insurance Law, published by Hart in 2019. Brendan practices in commercial law, commercial arbitration and insurance. He also acts in data disputes and regularly advises on data issues that arise in a commercial context. He is also a member of the Attorney General’s A panel of counsel and is regularly instructed in high profile judicial review claims against central government departments. Brendan is also an affiliate lecturer in competition law at Cambridge University.
Alison Padfield QC
Alison Padfield QC is a barrister specialising in commercial dispute resolution. She has particular expertise in insurance and reinsurance, professional conduct/discipline and regulation, and professional liability.
Alison is the author of Insurance Claims (Bloomsbury Professional). The 5th edition of Insurance Claims has gone to press and will be published this month.
Alison won Insurance Silk of the Year at the Chambers & Partners UK Bar Awards 2020.
Decision-making by (re)insurers – limits on contractual rights
In this lecture, Alison will discuss the impact of Braganza v BP Shipping Ltd and look at how the developing principles might apply in various contexts such as:
- Clauses requiring ‘proof satisfactory to insurers’ (PHI – current status of Napier v UNUM)
- Requirements for insurers’ consent
- Claims control clauses
- Innocent non-disclosure clauses (UK Acorn Finance v Markel)
David Mortlock is a partner and chair of the Global Trade & Investment Group at the law firm of Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP in Washington. David provides clients with guidance on compliance and enforcement on national-security related issues, including sanctions and export controls, anti-money laundering, and CFIUS. He helps clients build and implement compliance programs, conduct internal investigations, respond to government inquiries, and address with enforcement actions. From October 2013 to November 2015, David was Director for International Economic Affairs at the White House National Security Council, where he was responsible for coordinating interagency work on sanctions, anticorruption, and other illicit finance issues. From August 2009 to October 2013, he held a number of roles at the Department of State, including Attorney-Advisor for Sanctions and Terror Finance and Deputy Coordinator for Sanctions Policy. David was centrally involved in developing and/or easing the sanctions programs for Russia, Iran, Cuba, Syria, and Venezuela, among other programs.
David will discuss the U.S. economic sanctions regime and its implications for the global insurance industry. In recent years, U.S. authorities, particularly the Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), have shown increased interest in insurance providers, brokers and re-insurers and have brought a number of enforcement actions based on prohibited coverage, claims, and even related payments involving U.S. financial institutions. David will address these shifting risks for the insurance industry in the midst of an expanding U.S. regime and the transition to the Biden-Harris Administration.